Students of all walks join American National University to earn their education to unlock their true potentials and enter new careers. Our students are dedicated and hard-working, and their student services advisors want to recognize all the hard work they’ve done. These three nursing students all share one common trait in their success – they truly care for all people and wish to help all patients that come to them in their time of need. With their compassion and drive to succeed, Kylie, Jimma, and Amanda are being recognized by their advisors.
Kylie Jett-Brown
For Kylie Jett-Brown, caring for others has been intrinsic to what she has always wanted to do. As a mother of two and caregiver for her ill mother, she sought our online BSN program to help her fulfill her nursing dreams without disrupting her schedule. “I actually found [ANU] when I was in the hospital with [my mother], so it’s kind of cool. You know, you see nurses and then you find a nursing school that’s just like: ‘you can do this!’” Attending ANU is helping Kylie achieve a lifelong dream of becoming a nurse.
Something that drew Kylie to us was our flexibility. Not only do our classes cater to her schedule, but even more so, the instruction is compatible with her life.
“I started reading about [ANU] and I was like, ‘it’s accredited in Tennessee… what?’ And the virtual reality – that is so cool because I can’t do clinicals five days a week and classes. I have to work full time. I [saw] half your clinicals are virtual reality and I was like, ‘no way!’”
In her first and only term at ANU so far, Kylie has been impacted by Dr. Courtney Phoenix. “She’s very well rounded and knows a lot of things! She makes you think deeper – you’re kind of rewiring your brain… like in our discussion posts, she’ll ask you questions on your discussions. Just the way you have to think about it, like I want to think like her! She brings such great knowledge to the classroom.”
She has goals to be a light to her patients’ lives – to be able to save them even in their worst traumas.
She tells new students: “You need to be ready… Be confident in yourself, be confident in your work! Use your resources, [ANU] is so resourceful in what it gives you.”
Fun fact: Loves the outdoors, hiking, and being in nature.
Jimma Hall
As a mother to three, wife, and overall caretaker, Jimma Hall knew that nursing was the role she was destined to be in. Having experience in the healthcare field as a respiratory therapist, she knew she wanted to broaden her horizons and see patients through any stage of their care. Attending ANU’s associate degree in nursing at our Pikeville, Kentucky campus gives her the opportunity to do more within the field. When she was working in her previous career, one of her friends graduated from ANU – and that inspired her to join our ranks. “She is an excellent nurse… ANU is pretty awesome too. It’s really convenient, they make it convenient for people that have a life outside of school, too, so that’s really nice!”
“It’s been really great, I feel with ANU you’re really not just a number,” she explains about her time at ANU since the beginning. “I feel like it’s a tight knit group of people, and they make you feel really welcome, too! I went to a different college before, and it was bigger, and there’s a huge difference.”
Jimma specifically calls out professors Angie Coleman and Laverne Thacker as being instrumental in her education so far. “They have went above and beyond to make my experience at [ANU] over the top. And they want us to be great nurses, they want us to achieve our goals,” she says of the two, a wide smile on her face. She explains that all of her instructors understand that their students are not just students, but are parents, workers, and partners, “I think a lot of that has to do with them being mothers, too.”
She has goals to work in a hospital and one day become a Nurse Practitioner after putting work into her career to gain experience.
Her advice to new students: “Put your whole self into it. You can’t have one leg in, one leg out. You gotta go in hard! [ANU] lays the whole thing out for you, you just have to take it and run with it.”
Fun fact: Big into fitness, loves to work out
Amanda Bailey
After years of focusing on taking care of her children, Amanda Bailey turned to American National University to earn her associate degree in Nursing at our Pikeville, Kentucky campus. Despite having to put off her education, she has worked in the healthcare field all this time, waiting for the day to come to become the nurse she’s always dreamed of being. Even after surviving a car collision, Amanda has kept up with her education, pushing forward to make it to November when she will finish her education. Amanda has enjoyed her education to the point of recommending “it to several people – I do know there are three in the term behind me that have come [from my recommendation], and there’s one that I work with that’s getting ready to try to get in the next accepted date.” Not only that, but Amanda’s daughter has also been attending ANU along with her!
The reasons why she loves ANU and recommends it to so many are abundant. She describes how the professors have always been there for her during her educational career. “The instructors are awesome. You know, I’ve been to other schools and it’s like they were there for their jobs and nothing else. [At ANU], they want you to learn. If you don’t understand it, they try to help you better understand things…” Along with that, ANU has been the only school that accommodates her as a working parent.
“If you are trying to work and go to school, then it’s a great program for that. This is the only school that I actually found that would work with my work schedule… I hear a lot of moms say, ‘I would love to go back to school, but I have to work.’ And I go, ‘hey, listen to this school I go to!’”
Not only that, but ANU has become like a second home and family to her. She says, “the school in general is – you don’t feel like you’re overwhelmed and – it’s really hard to explain because you feel like you’re right at home whenever you come there.” When it comes to the connections she’s made, she explains, “in my class, we came in together so we’re all like one big family! We all want to see each other pass, we do not want to leave anyone behind… We come in together, we’re going out together.”
Amanda has goals to be on the front lines of the emergency department, helping those in their hardest times of need. She wants to stay local in a hospital for a while until her kids are grown and independent from her to do travel nursing. She wants to experience different parts of the country, different cultures, and people in travel nursing to learn new things.
Her advice to new students: “Go in with a good attitude, don’t go in with ‘I can’t.” Because you can do it… Make friends, don’t just be a loner, because in nursing school you can’t be a loner – you need friends! Study hard and hang in there!”
Fun fact: about to marry her fiancé! Love hunting, fishing, and riding side-by-sides.
American National University – Be live, in class, from anywhere.
